Project Detail

Description

Our non-profit foundation, The Soulcial® SOLUTIONS Foundation (http://www.soulcialsolutions.com), has opened up a new online sales site called Soulcial® WEAR at http://www.soulcialwear.com. On this site, we currently sell T-shirts, but expect our product inventory to grow to include different types of outerwear in the coming year. While our current T-Shirt inventory is all priced the same, future items will be priced at varying price points. Critical to our business model is our ability to allow, during the order process, our customers to select from a list of "Soulcially® Approved" charities, to which a portion of the profits from each sale will go.
Recently, we have been received inquiries from retailers who wish to purchase our products wholesale and then sell them in their stores. Since the “charity selection routine” is the Soulcial® bedrock of our business model, we have been grappling with ways to maintain this critical process for the customers--whether they purchase directly from us through our website or via a commercial reseller.
While drinking a Coca-Cola product, I was struck by the simplicity and value of the mycokerewards.com campaign whereby customers enter a code online. Our Foundation's decided course of action was to pursue a similar coding scheme whereby we would affix small stickers to the hangtag of each product we send out wholesale to retailers. Customers who purchase our product would then go online to GiveSelect™--a code redemption website we have envisioned (a notional sample is posted at http://www.giveselect.com)--where they would enter their unique code along with personal/demographic information, then select the charity of their choice to receive the donation.

We require a developer who is capable of creating for us
1 - A "code-redemption" website interface (GiveSelect.com) and
2 – data-capture database hosted on our server, as well as
3 - A web-based code generation system and interface (also hosted on our server).

The code generation system shall be capable of being hosted on our server under the GiveSelect™ domain. It shall also be capable of generating a unique code (string of alphanumeric characters) that identifies the product and the associated profit margin for the product. That way, if a customer purchases a T-shirt and enters the code online--we will know that it is a T-shirt that carries an $8.00 profit margin, from which 25% of the profit goes to the charity the customer selects. We shall be capable of inputting (via a web-enabled interface) new or current products, as well as their associated profit margin, and have the system generate a specified number of unique codes (in MS Excel spreadsheet exportable format) that we can then print and affix to the hangtags of clothing. Each code must be unique and non-recurring. Each code shall also have a check-digit scheme that prevents customers from randomly entering acceptable codes.
The developer shall also produce for us a visually appealing and unique webpage, hosted on our server, under the GiveSelect™ domain. This webpage shall be capable of capturing the unique code string, along with customer data as presented on the notional webpage at http://www.giveselect.com. It shall then take the customer to either an associated “Thank You” webpage or an “Error” webpage that prompts the user to return and re-enter data.
The developer shall also produce for us an associated web-enabled Linux MySQL compatible database, hosted on our server under the GiveSelect™ domain, to capture the data input from the GiveSelect™ page. We shall then be capable of generating two outputs from the database: a report (grouped by month) of the charities to whom we must send donations and a running list of customers along with their associated purchases. The charity report should present us with a calendar-month grouped listing of charities selected by the customers and the associated donation amount (based upon the percentage of profit margin) totaled for each charity. The customer list shall present customers, along with their associated purchases (as cross-referenced by the code generation system—that will tell us “what” the customer purchased based upon the code entered by the customer). Both outputs should be capable of being exported in MS Excel spreadsheet format.
If you feel that you are capable of developing this system of systems, The Soulcial® SOLUTIONS Foundation is anxious to work with you. Please do not hesitate to contact us via http://www.soulcialsolutions.com for clarification or questions. We look forward to beginning this project.

--Matthew Fritz, Technical Director
The Soulcial® SOLUTIONS Foundation